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Concordia Lutheran Church
Stories from the Book of Kings | "The Lost Book"
Josiah becomes king as a child. Years into his reign, workers repairing the Temple make a startling discovery: the Book of the Law has been lost inside God's own house. The book God gave His people to live by was buried under neglect. That detail alone tells us how far Judah had fallen. When the book is read to Josiah, he tears his robes. He doesn't explain it away. He doesn't negotiate. He repents. His response is the question this story leaves with us: what happens when we actually hear God's Word? What would it mean to receive it as if for the first time? Jesus is the Word made flesh. He was never lost. He came looking for us.
Sedi & Orari
Concordia Lutheran Church
16801 Huebner Rd, San Antonio, TX 78258, USA
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https://concordia.cc/givingThe Lost Book - Stories from Kings, Week 9
August 9, 2026 - 2 Kings 22:1-13, 18-20
I'm guessing everyone hereowns a Bible. I would also guess that some of those Bibles haven't been opened in a long time. They aren't lost. You could walk to the shelf pick them up right now. Sometimes, that's an even harder kind of lost.
August 9, 2026 - 2 Kings 22:1-13, 18-20
I'm guessing everyone hereowns a Bible. I would also guess that some of those Bibles haven't been opened in a long time. They aren't lost. You could walk to the shelf pick them up right now. Sometimes, that's an even harder kind of lost.
Hold that thought. In 2 Kings 22, God’s WORD was lost inside His house. Their story may explain how the Word becomes lost in ours.
Open your Bibles to 2 Kings 22. Judah has just come through the darkest fifty years in her history. King Manasseh filled the land with idols. Then his grandson Josiah takes the throne. Josiah is eight years old. A boy king in a broken kingdom.
Eighteen years pass. Now, Josiah is twenty-six, and he has been clearing idols out of the land. The Temple is in a shambles and Josiah orders it be repaired. Workers haul out clutter and patch the walls. And in the middle of the construction, the high priest Hilkiah comes to the royal secretary with amazing news.
Open your Bibles to 2 Kings 22. Judah has just come through the darkest fifty years in her history. King Manasseh filled the land with idols. Then his grandson Josiah takes the throne. Josiah is eight years old. A boy king in a broken kingdom.
Eighteen years pass. Now, Josiah is twenty-six, and he has been clearing idols out of the land. The Temple is in a shambles and Josiah orders it be repaired. Workers haul out clutter and patch the walls. And in the middle of the construction, the high priest Hilkiah comes to the royal secretary with amazing news.
Wow. The Bible was lost in plain sight. Nobody stole it. No invader burned it. God's people stopped reading. Generation after generation, until finally it lay buried under the clutter of all the things that edged it out. That is how the Word usually gets lost. Not through catastrophe. Through neglect.
Think about it. God told Israel's kings to copy this book by hand. Every king. Then read it every day of his life. Deuteronomy 17. Josiah had NEVER read it.
Think about it. God told Israel's kings to copy this book by hand. Every king. Then read it every day of his life. Deuteronomy 17. Josiah had NEVER read it.
Why? God's WORD in Deuteronomy spelled out the covenant. Blessings for faithfulness. Curses for idolatry. Josiah heard it and realized his nation had been living under a curse for generations without knowing it. The WORD of God told him the truth, and he was heartbroken.
Notice: Josiah did not skim it. He heard it read out loud. The WORD of God is powerful and active. Where the WORD is, the Holy Spirit is at work.
Watch what the Holy Spirit does. Josiah sends his officials to a prophetess named Huldah.
Notice: Josiah did not skim it. He heard it read out loud. The WORD of God is powerful and active. Where the WORD is, the Holy Spirit is at work.
Watch what the Holy Spirit does. Josiah sends his officials to a prophetess named Huldah.
The king of Judah receives the WORD of God through a woman most of us have never heard of. Two weeks ago, it was a captive slave girl. God loves to speak through unlikely voices. Huldah confirms the judgment. But then she delivers God's personal word to Josiah. Because “your heart was responsive” he was humble,
The Hebrew word behind "responsive" means soft. God didn't praise the king's strength. He commended his open heart.
God's WORD is not buried under church clutter in San Antonio. It is on our shelves ... on our phones. We own more Bibles than any generation in history. But, we open our Bibles less and less. See, the devil doesn't need to burn our Bibles. He just needs to continue keeping us distracted so our Bibles stay closed.
God's WORD is not buried under church clutter in San Antonio. It is on our shelves ... on our phones. We own more Bibles than any generation in history. But, we open our Bibles less and less. See, the devil doesn't need to burn our Bibles. He just needs to continue keeping us distracted so our Bibles stay closed.
Nobody choses to lose the WORD of God. Nobody wakes up and says, today I'll quit listening. It happens like it happened in Jerusalem. Things get busy. A few days turn into a few weeks.Sometimes life becomes painful, and God seems silent. So we stop going to the place where He has promised to speak.Slowly, the most precious thing in the house gets covered over by the clutter of our lives.
So let me ask. What have we lost inside our own homes? What has the Word been saying about things we don't want to hear? Is there a grudge we keep feeding? A habit we keep protecting? A neighbor we keep refusing to love? Judah didn't fall away all at once. It fell one idol at a time.
And when we do open the Bible and it has something hard to say, the devil whispers. "See, that book always condemns you. You don’t need that kind of abuse!" People leave the church because all they heard was the Law... never the Gospel. If that is you, today I want you to hear the whole story.
So let me ask. What have we lost inside our own homes? What has the Word been saying about things we don't want to hear? Is there a grudge we keep feeding? A habit we keep protecting? A neighbor we keep refusing to love? Judah didn't fall away all at once. It fell one idol at a time.
And when we do open the Bible and it has something hard to say, the devil whispers. "See, that book always condemns you. You don’t need that kind of abuse!" People leave the church because all they heard was the Law... never the Gospel. If that is you, today I want you to hear the whole story.
Yes, it cuts. But it cuts like a surgeon, not like an enemy. The same Word that shows us our shortcomings is the Word that heals and blesses us.
Here is the Gospel. Jesus is the WORD of God. He kept every command we broke. He carried every curse we earned. He died our death. And He rose again to give us something we could never earn: forgiveness!
Look at the pictures God painted across His Book. When Josiah heard the Law read, he tore his robes. Centuries later, when Jesus finished bearing the Law's curse on the cross, something else was torn.
Here is the Gospel. Jesus is the WORD of God. He kept every command we broke. He carried every curse we earned. He died our death. And He rose again to give us something we could never earn: forgiveness!
Look at the pictures God painted across His Book. When Josiah heard the Law read, he tore his robes. Centuries later, when Jesus finished bearing the Law's curse on the cross, something else was torn.
Josiah's grief could tear cloth. God's grace tears open our way home.
The same WORD that shows us our shortcomings is the WORD that heals and blesses us.
Josiah was a good king, maybe the best since David. He cleared the idols out of the Temple and cleaned up the whole land. But a generation later, Judah still fell. We need a king greater Josiah. And we have one. Jesus doesn't just tidy things up on the outside. He gives us a new heart. Jesus does for us what we could never do for ourselves. We call that grace.
And here is what I am praying you will do. Open your Bible this week... every day. I am praying that God's WORD will become a daily part of your lives!
Josiah was a good king, maybe the best since David. He cleared the idols out of the Temple and cleaned up the whole land. But a generation later, Judah still fell. We need a king greater Josiah. And we have one. Jesus doesn't just tidy things up on the outside. He gives us a new heart. Jesus does for us what we could never do for ourselves. We call that grace.
And here is what I am praying you will do. Open your Bible this week... every day. I am praying that God's WORD will become a daily part of your lives!
This week, open your Bible (paper, phone, online). You will discover that God has a message for you today. He loves you... you are the apple of His eye. And if, like Josiah, God’s WORD brings up something heavy (guilt, grief, some kind of pain) please do not carry that alone. Come talk to one of our pastors. Getting help is not a failure of faith.
What was lost in Josiah’s time is not lost in ours. We have God’s Word. And that Word, tells us that we are not lost either.Godcame looking for us.He carried our curse.He paved the way home. The God who wrote the Bible has never once stopped longing to communicate with you. The same Word that shows us our shortcomings is the Word that heals and blesses us. Open theBook. Jesus is already there.
What was lost in Josiah’s time is not lost in ours. We have God’s Word. And that Word, tells us that we are not lost either.Godcame looking for us.He carried our curse.He paved the way home. The God who wrote the Bible has never once stopped longing to communicate with you. The same Word that shows us our shortcomings is the Word that heals and blesses us. Open theBook. Jesus is already there.